Toads and Diamonds
A Novel
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3.7 • 3 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Diribani has come to the village well to get water for her family's scant meal of curry and rice. She never expected to meet a goddess there. Yet she is granted a remarkable gift: Flowers and precious jewels drop from her lips whenever she speaks.
It seems only right to Tana that the goddess judged her kind, lovely stepsister worthy of such riches. And when she encounters the goddess, she is not surprised to find herself speaking snakes and toads as a reward.
Blessings and curses are never so clear as they might seem, however. Diribani's newfound wealth brings her a prince—and an attempt on her life. Tana is chased out of the village because the province's governor fears snakes, yet thousands are dying of a plague spread by rats. As the sisters' fates hang in the balance, each struggles to understand her gift. Will it bring her wisdom, good fortune, love . . . or death?
Toads and Diamonds is a 2011 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in a lightly fictionalized India, Tomlinson s retelling of the Perrault fairy tale gains new resonance in a culture where reptiles are honored. Stepsisters Diribani, 15, and Tana, 16, are struggling to keep their household together after their father s murder. He was a jewel merchant, and Tana hopes to follow in his footsteps. But these dreams are swept out of reach when Diribani comes back from the local well bringing not water but a gift from the snake goddess, Naghali gems and flowers that drop from her lips when she speaks. The girls mother quickly sends Tana to the well, too, but she returns with an even stranger gift of snakes, frogs, and toads. The awe over Diribani s gift from people both humble and mighty is predictable, but it s refreshing to see the matter-of-fact welcome that Tana s snakes receive from the townspeople. Tomlinson (The Swan Maiden) does not oversimplify in this well-told tale; human discord and the harmony of nature are entwined with simplicity and elegance as the girls travel, physically and emotionally, to places they had never imagined. Ages 12 up.
